


Firefly; or, I Am (Not) a Girl

by yuutsuhime



Series: Firefly [3]
Category: Persona 3
Genre: Arisato Minako is Named Ikari Hotaru, Character Study, Coming Out, F/F, Friendship, Gender Confusion, Kissing, Nonbinary Aigis (Persona Series), Robot/Human Relationships, Slice of Life, Trans Female Arisato Minako, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-31 01:47:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19415959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuutsuhime/pseuds/yuutsuhime
Summary: Somewhere between fall and winter during Persona 3, the protagonist and Aigis question their identities and confide in each other.





	Firefly; or, I Am (Not) a Girl

**Author's Note:**

> My ongoing headcanon with the trans female protagonist is that she starts the story resembling the male protagonist, and slowly moves closer to what the female protagonist looks like as she comes out.
> 
> i write Aigis as a nonbinary woman. Based on the canon I feel like Aigis has been taught a lot of gender roles (which are really confusing for her), but I ultimately see her finding comfort in femininity even if the circumstances of her life and self-image are fundamentally nonbinary and not cis, and she is _definitely_ sapphic. This is why I'm categorizing this as F/F.

### 1.

Aigis is young and her neural network is still being trained by a series of researchers she can't tell apart. They read picture books to her.

"What can you tell me about the dragon, Aigis," the researcher with the book asks.

"I have classified the dragon as: bad, dangerous, and red," Aigis responds.

"And how about the princess?"

"Female."

"Anything else?"

"No."

"Okay, how about the prince?"

"The prince is: good, strong, and 'in love'."

"I see. So here's the tricky part, Aigis. Which one are _you_ the most like?"

Aigis thinks. "The prince."

"And can you explain why?"

"The dragon is less strong than the prince. And the prince is not a female."

* * *

Years later, Aigis meets a ~~boy~~ in the woods. ~~He~~ has dyed blue hair and scoleosis, and wears swim trunks and a gray t-shirt soaked up to the ribs with seawater.

"I must protect you," she tells ~~him~~ , and to the boy's credit, ~~he~~ isn't shocked or upset. Aigis holds ~~him~~ then, trying to classify everything around them. It's a fairy tale soaked in dirt, with too many strangers watching.

"Who are you," the ~~boy~~ asks. ~~His~~ hair smells like conditioner, like a princess.

### 2.

"This isn't a fairy tale," Hotaru tells Aigis, half-jokingly. Her hair is still blue at the ends, and when they're alone she puts it up with the cheap clips Aigis got at the kiosk down the block. Hotaru was too afraid to buy anything feminine on her own, even if Aigis was there, but it was a blushing, hopeful kind of anxiety. A fragile thing that existed only in the soft lamplight of Hotaru's room, alongside the name she picked for herself.

"I will protect you," Aigis says. "If anyone ever hurts you, I will annihilate them instantly."

Hotaru laughs uneasily. "You can't annihilate my friends."

"Is this not a normal process that all young men undergo?"

"It really isn't," she says, shakily. "Fuck. I guess it is hard to understand being afraid of your friends. It's like — they're friends with _guy_ me, and this just changes a _lot_."

"You're afraid," Aigis says.

"Yeah," Hotaru says. She fiddles with the clips in her hair and glances at her reflection in her switched-off phone screen, as if she's making sure she's still there. Fiddles with the clips again to make sure they're symmetric on her hairline. When Hotaru touches the boy-uniform she's wearing, Aigis can see Hotaru start mentally cataloguing all the boy-things in her room she needs to get rid of; watches Hotaru scan her body from head to toe for everything that shouldn't be there.

"I can't do it today," Hotaru says, finally. "Can you help me order McDonald's?"

So Aigis does, and they watch each other as Hotaru puts on her men's shoes with men's socks, and they leave her room. Aigis stands close as Junpei absently says "Take care, ~~Minato~~ " as they leave, and Hotaru sees her reflection in the door glass and pulls the clips out of her hair, her eyes wide. "Do you think anyone saw," she asks.

Aigis stands still and rewinds her memory for thirty seconds. "I can confirm that nobody saw."

Hotaru breathes a sigh of relief. "God, what would I do without you."

At the fast food place Hotaru receives a _Thank you, ~~sir~~_ and it doesn't even sting that much. Her masculinity is still a glove that fits around her body; almost a necessity to protect the tiny, glowing parts of herself that live in her room.

Right now, Hotaru is a reflection of a girl. She is her own name on a class assignment, the temptation to leave it unchanged, and the hesitation that makes her erase it. She is a collection of femininity that fits in a desk drawer. She's sitting on her bed with Aigis, eating for the first time in a day, thinking about untouchable clothes sections in department stores, how fabric might fall on her own body, how makeup would look on her face; clinging to anything — hope, maybe — of a less quiet future.

Later, when they kiss, neither of them know what's happening.

### 3.

A month later, Yukari knows. Aigis can sometimes see the panic in Hotaru's eyes, watching as Hotaru's secret expands helplessly outwards. An inevitability; metastasizing.

"Hey," says Junpei, outside Hotaru's door.

"Hey," Hotaru says, her voice shaking. "Don't open the door yet — you can't tell anyone else."

"Dude, what? You're acting like you've got someone's _body_ in there..."

Hotaru looks at Aigis and nods.

* * *

After it's over, Junpei looks at Hotaru and says "So if we're not bros, then—"

"We can still be bros," Hotaru says, bashfully.

"But you're a girl! A girl can't be a bro. Or... wait—"

"It doesn't make me feel bad or anything. Like, I just think a girl can be a bro. Like I'm the same person and all..."

"I know, I know... It's just—"

"You're still my best friend. And, like... Being bros was cool. I don't wanna lose that, or you." Hotaru stops. "God, fuck, I sound so fucking gay right now."

"Dude, you're gay too?" Junpei exlaims. "Man—"

"It's a lot, yeah," Hotaru says.

"What, like, for dudes?" Junpei is genuinely having trouble.

"No, for girls."

"But that's—"

"I liked girls before, but I thought I was a dude so that wasn't gay. But I'm a girl and I like girls, which is gay."

"Huh. I guess it does work like that."

"Surprise, I guess," says Hotaru, smiling. There's a pause. "Obviously you can't tell _anyone_ else about—"

"I promise," Junpei says. "It's a promise between bros, or whatever. You can't break those."

Hotaru laughs. "Of course."

### 4.

Hotaru is in the common room, sitting next to Yukari.

"Hey—" Junpei protests.

"It's something only us girls would understand," Yukari shouts, leaning closer to Hotaru in solidarity. They're having fun. Hotaru is blushing; she's become intensely interested in the furniture.

### 5.

Aigis and Hotaru are laying on Hotaru's bed.

"Is it true that you only like girls?" Aigis asks.

"It's true that I don't like boys," Hotaru says, and then catches herself. "What's up?"

"I'm not a girl, am I," Aigis states.

Hotaru glances up from her video game to Aigis. "I like you," she says. It was the wrong time to say that, and so she stutters on. "I mean, do you want to be a girl?"

"I'm a robot. A robot cannot be 'male' or 'female'. And even though I was designed to look 'female', I can't understand why that was chosen for me."

Hotaru listens, and doesn't say anything, so Aigis continues.

"Perhaps I'm being selfish. Do I want to be female only because it allows the possibility of... reciprocation? Who am I performing this femininity for? and what if... What if you stop enjoying my presence if I cease to be female in your eyes?"

"I was born a guy," Hotaru says. "I guess I just kept doing it because it's what I had. I didn't think about what really made me happy because I was too busy just... Living."

"For who should I live for, then? and as what? I want to remain by your side, and—"

"And I want you to be there, as yourself. Like, the _you_ that you want to be."

Aigis can't remember when they started holding hands. "I don't know what I am," Aigis whispers.

"You're here," Hotaru says, "And you have time. And you can show me any version of yourself that you want to, and I'll be happy."

Aigis leans forward and rests her head on Hotaru's shoulder. Waits like she's taking a deep breath. "I don't think I'm female," Aigis says.

Hotaru leans back. "Then I don't only like girls."

They kiss again, and Aigis can feel herself falling, with Hotaru's arms around her.

"What do you want to do," Hotaru asks.

"I want you to hold me," Aigis says. "And maybe—"

"Yeah?"

"I want to try on your old uniform," Aigis says.

Hotaru gets up, surprised, and retrieves the uniform from the closet. Women's clothes are gradually crowding out her old wardrobe, and she blushes again.

"How is it," Hotaru asks. She's looking at the carpet, which isn't Aigis.

Aigis looks herself up and down in the mirror. "This is also uncomfortable," she remarks. "It's quite warm."

"Yeah," Hotaru says. "Normally you just wear a button-up under the blazer, and not a whole girl's uniform."

"Human beings use fashion to express their own self," Aigis muses. "I am a robot with no need for it, and yet—"

"You have a self," Hotaru says, wrapping her arms around Aigis from behind. They look at their reflections for a while, tentatively. Aigis eventualy slips the blazer off and leaves it on Hotaru's desk. It's the first time Hotaru turns away from the mirror with a smile.


End file.
